With pounded chicken breasts and a straightforward pan sauce consisting of capers, butter, white wine, and lemon juice, chicken piccata comes together in a jiffy.
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 15 mins |
| Total Time: | 25 mins |
| Servings: | 4 |
Ingredients
- 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
- cayenne pepper to taste
- salt and ground black pepper to taste
- all-purpose flour for dredging
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon capers, drained
- ½ cup white wine
- ¼ cup fresh lemon juice
- ¼ cup water
- 3 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut in 1/4-inch slices
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley
Instructions
- Place chicken breasts between 2 sheets of heavy plastic on a solid, level surface. Firmly pound chicken breasts with the smooth side of a meat mallet to a 1/2-inch thickness.
- Season both sides of chicken breasts with cayenne, salt, and black pepper; dredge lightly in flour and shake off any excess.
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- Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Place chicken in the pan, reduce heat to medium, and cook until browned and cooked through, about 5 minutes per side; transfer to a plate.
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- Cook capers in reserved oil, smashing them lightly to release brine, until warmed through, about 30 seconds. Pour white wine into the skillet and bring to a boil while scraping the browned bits of food off the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Cook until reduced by half, about 2 minutes.
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- Stir lemon juice, water, and butter into the reduced wine mixture; cook and stir continuously to form a thick sauce, about 2 minutes. Reduce heat to low and stir parsley through the sauce.
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- Return chicken breasts to the pan and cook until heated through, 1 to 2 minutes. Serve with sauce spooned over the top.
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Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 321 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 8 g |
| Cholesterol | 88 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 0 g |
| Protein | 25 g |
| Saturated Fat | 7 g |
| Sodium | 224 mg |
| Sugars | 1 g |
| Fat | 18 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
Simple to make and delicious! Could become my go-to chicken dish.
Delicious! It wasn’t a quick prep but worth the effort.
Super easy & fast to put together & cook. Very delicious upscale taste that’s not too rich, lemon, capers & wine compliment each other. I will definitely fix it again & again.
This is easy, and bursting with flavor. I use chicken thighs instead of breats becuase they’re better. I also skipped the water. I love the sour lemonyness and salty capers.
I think this is excellent, and I’ve made it several times. I add additional capers because I like them. The sauce is just fantastic. The best advice I could give is to have all of your ingredients ready and at hand when you start cooking the chicken. Easy, and as good as I’ve had anywhere.
Didn’t like this at all. Watery lemony and spicy. I’ll stick to my recipe from now on
This is an easy, fast, delicious recipe that I have made several times. Instead of pounding out the chicken breasts, I buy the thinly sliced cutlets to make this simple recipe even simpler. I also add onion and garlic powder to the seasoning to give it more flavor, but that’s more of a personal preference than a recipe flaw. Definitely give this recipe a try, and check out Chef John’s other recipes as well. He has never steered us wrong!
I have made this recipe several times, and both my husband and I love it! I did incorporate someone else’s suggestion to use a bit less lemon juice, but I double the sauce and use extra capers because we really enjoy the sauce and the capers. I serve it with linguine or angel hair pasta. Thank you, Chef John, for this delightfully easy and delicious meal!
Love this recipe but I do change it up…I hate cooking with wine so I use chicken broth instead and I throw broccoli in it at the end and serve it over fettuccine pasta.
Amazing how people will rate a recipe that they made changes to. Perhaps those changes might have not been the best idea? Just saying.
I love this recipe. I make it for Sunday dinners and the whole family likes it. It is quick and easy. I usually swirl cooked linguine in the sauce.
I will double the sauce next time.
I left out the flour and I think next time I’ll leave out the wine. Very easy and tasty recipe.
Came out delicious! The only change I made was using 1/8 of lemon juice based on other reviews.
Flavors were spot on. Only thing I would change is doubling the sauce
Good idea but for two of us I only used 2 chicken cutlets. I did not pound the chicken cutlets, and also seasoned the flour with salt and black pepper and I used 1/3 cup of Chicken stock instead of water, used only 1/8 cup of white wine, 1 tble spoon of butter and 2 tablespoons of capers and juice of one lemon and the zest of one lemon. did not use cayenne pepper at all. Water makes it too plain-hence the chicken stock substitute.
This is my go-to Chicken Piccata recipe because it’s quick, but full of flavor. I make a garlic cauliflower mash to go with it.
The ease to taste ratio of this dish is 10/10. Simple yet tasty can’t be beat! My entire family was impressed
I didn’t have capers and still turned out great! I made chicken tenders and just added a little extra of everything. I also added sweet basil and dried parsley to the sauce. My picky eater grandsons went back for seconds!
Awesome recipe. I used an egg wash and bread crumbs instead of flour.
The chicken part is just fine, but that sauce calls for waaayyyy too much lemon. Had to rework it completely and add flour to make it thicken.